“Can I ask you something?” Harrison asked.
“Sure,” Mackenzie said.
“Why were you so fixated on their finances? Did it have something to do with what you saw in the Sterlings’ place?”
“Yeah. It’s just a hunch for now, but some of the transactions were – ”
Harrison’s phone started vibrating again. He scooped it out of his pocket with an embarrassed look on his face. He checked the display, nearly ignored it, but then kept it out as they walked back toward the car.
“Sorry, I have to take this,” he said. “It’s my sister. She called while we were inside, too. Which is weird.”
Mackenzie didn’t pay him much attention as they got into the car. She was barely even listening to Harrison’s end of the conversation as he started speaking. However, by the time she had pulled back out onto the street, she could tell by his tone that something was very wrong.
When he ended the call, there was a shocked expression on his face. His bottom lip had a sort of curl to it, somewhere between a grimace and a frown.
“Harrison?”
“My mom died this morning,” he said.
“Oh my God,” Mackenzie said.
“Heart attack…just like that. She’s – ”
Mackenzie could tell that he was struggling not to break down in tears. He turned his head away from her, looking out of the passenger side window, and started to let it out.
“I’m so sorry, Harrison,” she said. “Let’s get you back home. I’ll set up the flight now. Anything else you need?”
He only gave a brief shake of the head, still looking away from her as he wept a bit more openly.
Mackenzie first made a call to Quantico. She was unable to get McGrath on the phone so she left a message with his receptionist, letting her know what had happened and that Harrison would be on a flight back into DC as soon as possible. She then called the airline and grabbed the first available flight, which departed in three and a half hours.
The moment the flight was booked and she ended the call, her phone rang. Giving Harrison a sympathetic look, she answered it. It felt terrible to resort back to a work mentality after Harrison’s news but she had a job to do – and there were still no solid leads.
“This is Agent White,” she said.
“Agent White, this is Officer Dagney. I thought you might want to know that we have a potential lead.”
“Potential?” she asked.
“Well, he certainly fits the profile. This is a guy that was booked on multiple home invasions, two of which included violence and sexual assault.”
“In the same areas as the Kurtzes and Sterlings?”
“That’s where it gets promising,” Dagney said. “One of the instances that involved sexual assault happened in the same group of townhouses the Kurtzes lived in.”
“Do we have an address for the guy?”
“Yeah. He works at an auto garage. A small one. And we’ve got confirmation that he’s there right now. Name of Mike Nell.”
“Send me the address and I’ll go have a talk with him. And any word on the financial records Harrison requested?” Mackenzie asked.
“Not yet. We’ve got some guys working on it, though. Shouldn’t take too long.”
Mackenzie killed the call and did her best to give Harrison his moment of grief. He was no longer weeping, but was clearly having to make an effort to keep it together.
“Thanks,” Harrison said, wiping a stray tear away from his face.
“For what?” Mackenzie asked.
He shrugged. “Calling McGrath and the airport. Sorry this is such a pain in the midst of the case.”
“It’s not,” she said. “Harrison, I’m very sorry for your loss.”
After that, the car fell into silence and whether she liked it or not, Mackenzie’s mind slipped back into work mode. There was a killer somewhere out there, apparently with some odd vengeance to enact upon happy couples. And he might be awaiting her this very second.
Mackenzie could barely wait to meet him.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Dropping Harrison off at the motel was bittersweet. She wished she could do more for him or, at the very least, offer some more comforting words. In the end, though, she only gave him a half-hearted wave as he went into his room to pack his things and call a cab to take him to the airport.
Once his door had closed behind him, Mackenzie pasted the address Dagney had sent her into her GPS. Lipton Auto Garage was exactly seventeen minutes from the motel, a distance she started to cover right away.
Being alone in the car felt strange but she again distracted herself with the Miami scenery. It was different from any other beach-oriented city she had ever been in. Where smaller towns situated by the beach seemed a little sandy and almost faded, everything in Miami seemed to shine and sparkle despite the nearby sand and salt spray from the ocean. Here and there she would see a building that seemed out of place, neglected and forlorn – a reminder that everything had its blemishes.
She arrived at the garage sooner than she expected, having been distracted by taking in the sights of the city. She parked in a lot that was overcrowded with broken down cars and trucks that were obviously being pillaged for spare parts. It looked like the sort of operation that was forever in a state of almost going bankrupt.
Before walking into the place, she did a quick once-over of the place. There was a run-down front office that was currently unattended. The attached garage held three bays, only one of which contained a car; it was up on risers but did not look to be having any work done on it. In the garage, one man was rummaging through a shelf-shaped toolbox. Another was in the very back of the garage, standing on a small ladder and rifling through a series of old cardboard boxes.
Mackenzie walked over to the man closest to her, the one looking through the toolbox. He looked to be nearing forty, with long greasy hair that hung down to his shoulders. The stubble on his face was not quite a beard. When he looked up at her as she approached, he smiled brightly.
“Hey, darlin’,” he said with a bit of a Southern accent. “What can I help you with today?”
Mackenzie flashed her badge. “You can stop calling me darling first of all. Then you can tell me if you happen to be Mike Nell.”
“Yeah, that’s me,” he said. He was staring at her ID with something like fear. He then looked back at her face, as if trying to decide if he was part of some prank.
“Mr. Nell, I’d like for you to – ”
He wheeled around quickly and shoved her. Hard. She stumbled backward and her feet struck a tire that was lying on the ground. As she lost her footing and went falling to her backside, she caught a glimpse of Nell running away. He was leaving the garage, running and looking over his shoulder.
That escalated quickly, she thought. He’d sure as hell guilty of something.
Her instincts wanted to go for her gun. But that would cause a scene. So she got up and gave chase. Yet, as she pushed herself up, her hand fell on something else that had been left on the floor. It was a lug wrench – possibly the one that had taken off the tire she had fallen over.
She picked it up and quickly got to her feet. She dashed to the front of the garage and saw Nell at the sidewalk, about to cross the street. Mackenzie quickly looked both ways, saw that there were no cars within a few feet, and drew her arm back.
She launched the lug wrench through the air with as much force as she could. It sailed over the fifteen feet or so that separated her and Nell, striking him squarely in the back. He let out a yelp of surprise and pain before